TCM Schedule for Thursday, July 8 -- TCM Spotlight -- Teen Movies

[Staph]

A day of crime and an evening of Teen Movies. Enjoy!


5:15am -- Shadowing the Third Man (2004)
Documentary about the classic Cold War thriller The Third Man (1949).
Narrator: John Hurt
Dir: Frederick Baker
BW-60 mins, TV-PG

Cary Grant was considered for the part of Harry Lime. Conicidentally, Grant was a regular lunchtime visitor to the set of the film when the shooting returned to London sound-stages.


6:30am -- Beyond A Reasonable Doubt (1956)
A novelist frames himself for murder to prove the fallibility of circumstantial evidence.
Cast: Dana Andrews, Joan Fontaine, Sidney Blackmer, Arthur Franz
Dir: Fritz Lang
BW-80 mins, TV-PG

The last film that Fritz Lang made in the USA before returning to Germany.


8:00am -- Nora Prentiss (1947)
An ambitious singer ruins a doctor's life.
Cast: Ann Sheridan, Kent Smith, Bruce Bennett, Robert Alda
Dir: Vincent Sherman
BW-112 mins, TV-PG

In 1939 a fraternity bet inspired a UCLA student to handcuff himself to Ann Sheridan during a movie premiere and then swallow the key. A locksmith had to be summoned to the theater to unlock her.


10:00am -- The Locket (1946)
A dark personal secret drives a young woman to use every man she encounters.
Cast: Laraine Day, Brian Aherne, Robert Mitchum, Gene Raymond
Dir: John Brahm
BW-85 mins, TV-PG

The set used in this film for the house of Mrs. Willis (Katherine Emery) is the same one used for the house of Alex Sebastian (Claude Rains) in Notorious (1946).


11:30am -- The Strip (1951)
A jazz drummer fights to clear his name when he's accused of killing a racketeer.
Cast: Mickey Rooney, Sally Forrest, William Demarest, James Craig
Dir: Leslie Kardos
BW-86 mins, TV-PG

Nominated for an Oscar for Best Music, Original Song -- Bert Kalmar, Harry Ruby and Oscar Hammerstein II for the song "A Kiss to Build a Dream on"

Of Joe Pasternak's 57 MGM productions released between 1942 and 1966, this film was just one of two which failed to garner a contemporary New York Times review. The second movie was Looking for Love (1964).


1:00pm -- The Narrow Margin (1952)
A tough cop meets his match when he has to guard a gangster's moll on a tense train ride.
Cast: Charles McGraw, Marie Windsor, Jacqueline White, Gordon Gebert
Dir: Richard Fleischer
BW-72 mins, TV-PG

Nominated for an Oscar for Best Writing, Motion Picture Story -- Martin Goldsmith and Jack Leonard

Filmed in 1950, not released until 1952. According to director Richard Fleischer, when the film was finished RKO Pictures owner Howard Hughes heard good things about it and ordered that a copy of it be delivered to him so he could screen it in his private projection room. The film stayed in the projection room for more than a year, apparently because the eccentric Hughes forgot about it.


2:15pm -- Born To Kill (1947)
A murderer marries a young innocent then goes after her more experienced sister.
Cast: Claire Trevor, Lawrence Tierney, Walter Slezak, Phillip Terry
Dir: Robert Wise
BW-92 mins, TV-PG

Off-screen, Lawrence Tierney's arrests for drunken brawls at bars and Hollywood parties took a heavy toll on his once-promising Hollywood career in the 1950s. Booze was always at the root of his misbehavior, which included tearing a public phone off the wall, hitting a waiter in the face with a sugar bowl, breaking a college student's jaw and attempting to choke a cab driver.


4:00pm -- The Unsuspected (1947)
The producer of a radio crime series commits the perfect crime, then has to put the case on the air.
Cast: Joan Caulfield, Claude Rains, Audrey Totter, Constance Bennett
Dir: Michael Curtiz
BW-103 mins, TV-PG

Debut of character actor Fred Clark.


6:00pm -- Dark Passage (1947)
A man falsely accused of his wife's murder escapes to search for the real killer.
Cast: Humphrey Bogart, Lauren Bacall, Bruce Bennett, Agnes Moorehead
Dir: Delmer Daves
BW-106 mins, TV-PG

The third of four films made by husband and wife Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall, and the first film in which Humphrey Bogart wore a full hairpiece.


What's On Tonight: TCM SPOTLIGHT: TEEN MOVIES


8:00pm -- Gidget (1959)
A young girl dreams of winning acceptance from a gang of surfers.
Cast: Sandra Dee, James Darren, Cliff Robertson, Arthur O'Connell
Dir: Paul Wendkos
C-95 mins, TV-G

The title character was based on the author's daughter, Kathy Kohner-Zuckerman, and her adventures growing up in the surf culture on the beach at Malibu in the 1950's. As of this note (July 2006), she is 62, petite, healthy and attractive and living in Pacific Palisades with her husband of 42 years. And yes, there was a "Moondoggie", who still lives in California and is an artist.


10:00pm -- Beach Blanket Bingo (1965)
The surfing gang rescues a beautiful singer from evil bikers.
Cast: Frankie Avalon, Annette Funicello, Deborah Walley, Harvey Lembeck
Dir: William Asher
C-97 mins, TV-G

Nancy Sinatra was the original choice to play Sugar Kane. However, she backed out just before production was supposed to begin because a few months earlier her brother Frank Sinatra Jr. was kidnapped and when she found out that part of the plot involved a kidnapping she decided to back out. Interestingly, it would have been her motion picture debut.


12:00am -- Bikini Beach (1964)
A millionaire tries to prove that his pet chimp is as smart as the local teens.
Cast: Frankie Avalon, Annette Funicello, Martha Hyer, Harvey Lembeck
Dir: William Asher
C-100 mins, TV-G

Danielle Aubry's voice was dubbed by director 'William Asher (I)''s wife Elizabeth Montgomery.


2:00am -- Where The Boys Are (1960)
College coeds go looking for love during spring break in Fort Lauderdale.
Cast: Dolores Hart, Yvette Mimieux, Barbara Nichols, Paula Prentiss
Dir: Henry Levin
C-99 mins, TV-PG

Paula Prentiss' film debut.


4:00am -- Girl Happy (1965)
A rock singer is hired to chaperone a gangster's daughter in Fort Lauderdale.
Cast: Elvis Presley, Shelley Fabares, Harold J. Stone, Gary Crosby
Dir: Boris Sagal
C-96 mins, TV-PG

For reasons unknown, several of Elvis' songs are slightly sped up, making his voice sound higher than usual. This is most noticeable on the title track. This error appears to have originated in the recording studio, as the RCA soundtrack album retains the sped up versions of the songs. A recording of "Girl Happy", mastered at the proper speed, would not be released until the 1990s. The explanation came afterwards that it was intentional and that it was supposed to give the title track an upbeat feeling that it lacked apparently in the original version. It has to be reminded that this soundtrack was recorded at the height of the Beatlemania in June 1964 and that the record company tried to give some "extra-youth" to Elvis by speeding up the tape. 1964 is the first year Elvis Presley did not reach the TOP 10 with any of the six singles he released that year.

[Staph]

1. Gidget (1959)

The coming-of-age teen movie has been a part of American pop culture for decades, bridging generation gaps through the shared experience of growing up. The locations and time period might be different, but the theme was always the same: awkward youth on the threshold of adulthood. Gidget (1959), directed by Paul Wendkos, remains a classic of the sun and surf genre that preceded the Frankie Avalon/Annette Funicello Beach Party films of the 1960s. In it, Hollywood's wholesome teen icon, Sandra Dee, plays the gawky 16-year-old tomboy Frances Lawrence. Nicknamed "Gidget" by the local surfers to indicate a cross between a girl and a midget due to her slight stature, she's more interested in learning to surf with the guys than in dating them. That is, until she meets Moondoggie (James Darren), one of the surfers who's trying to decide between a life of being a beach bum like his older pal Kahuna (Cliff Robertson) or going on to college in the fall.

1959 was a big year for Sandra Dee, the perky ingenue born Alexandra Zuck. In addition to Gidget, she also appeared in two other big films that year - as Lana Turner's daughter in the Douglas Sirk melodrama Imitation of Life, and as Molly, the female lead opposite Troy Donahue in the sexually charged A Summer Place. The success of these movies solidified Dee's status as one of the screen's most promising young actresses.

James Darren (Moondoggie) had been a student of respected acting coach Stella Adler. Like Dee, he too was considered a rising young talent at the time of Gidget's release. Also a singer, Darren lent his vocal talents to Gidget, crooning the theme song and "The Next Best Thing to Love." He went on to record such top-40 hits as "Goodbye Cruel World" and "Her Royal Majesty" later in his career.

Gidget was based on the popular novel of the same name by Frederick Kohner, who based the title character on the adventures of his own daughter, Kathy. The book was adapted for the screen by Gabrielle Upton. But no one could have guessed what a phenomenon Gidget would become. It spawned two film sequels (Gidget Goes to Rome (1963) and Gidget Goes Hawaiian, 1961), two television series (Gidget (1965-66) and The New Gidget, 1986), and several TV movies along the way. Sandra Dee did not reprise her role in any of the sequels, though co-star James Darren portrayed Moondoggie twice more in Gidget Goes to Rome and Gidget Goes Hawaiian. Unknown teenage actress Sally Field made a name for herself as the bubbly surfer girl in the original 1960s TV show. Field, of course, went on to a major acting career that included two Academy Awards for her work in Norma Rae (1979) and Places in the Heart (1984).

Sandra Dee, the original movie Gidget, married pop idol Bobby Darin at the peak of her career in 1960. Though she continued to make movies including two of the Tammy films made popular by Debbie Reynolds and three movies with her husband, her career soon fizzled. When she divorced Darin in 1967, she found that there were few roles at the time for a divorced 26-year-old mother who was used to playing the wholesome role of America's teenaged sweetheart. James Darren went on to co-star in the hit 1980s television show T.J. Hooker, while Cliff Robertson won an Academy Award as Best Actor for the 1968 film Charly.

Producer: Lewis J. Rachmil
Director: Paul Wendkos
Screenplay: Frederick Kohner (book Gidget), Gabrielle Upton
Art Direction: Ross Bellah
Cinematography: Burnett Guffey
Film Editing: William A. Lyon
Original Music: Fred Karger, Stanley Styne
Cast: Sandra Dee (Gidget), Cliff Robertson (The Big Kahuna), James Darren (Moondoggie), Arthur O'Connell (Russell Lawrence), Mary LaRoche (Dorothy Lawrence), Joby Baker (Stinky), Tom Laughlin (Lover Boy), Jo Morrow (Mary Lou).
C-96m. Letterboxed.

by Andrea Foshee